Enmugakure
by Evandar
Summary: AU. The secret to stopping the Akatsuki lies in the demolished Enmugakure, but only one person knows where it is. Too bad he's in pieces. HidanTemari
1. Turncoat

Disclaimer: I don't own Naruto and I'm making no money from this story.

AN: I've been wanting to write this for a while, and I finally managed to get the first chapter to my liking. This follows the path of the manga up until after the Sasuke/Itachi fight, and contains spoilers for chapters up to and including 403, but after that it deviates wildly into AU. For those of you who are interested, the title means 'The Village Hidden in the Haze'. Anyway, this is my first multi-chaptered Naruto fic, and I hope you enjoy.

* * *

_Then the perilous path was planted,_

_And a river and a spring_

_On every cliff and tomb,_

_And on the bleached bones_

_Red clay brought forth;_

_Till the villain left the paths of ease,_

_To walk in perilous paths, and drive_

_The just man into barren climes._

The Argument

William Blake

Part I

Turncoat

The sun was setting, dying the sky the colour of blood. Uzumaki Naruto stepped back from the training post he'd been practising at and wiped his brow on the back of his hand as he surveyed the damage he'd done to the previously smooth wood. Then he winced and pulled a splinter out of his knuckles.

The wound healed in a matter of seconds, leaving only smooth unmarked skin behind, and Naruto sighed.

The leaves of the trees surrounding the training ground rustled in a light breeze and Naruto shivered. He tilted his head back to look up at the sky and stretched. "Ichiraku's should still be open," he mused aloud. "Man, I'm starved."

He grabbed his jacket from the grass where he'd flung it hours ago and turned to leave only to find his path blocked by a familiar figure in a black cloak decorated with red clouds.

"Itachi," Naruto said, his good mood dissolving. "If you're here to do your routine 'kidnap the Kyuubi boy' thing then I'm not interested. I'm hungry, tired and in desperate need of a shower, and this is really getting old."

He could have sworn he actually saw an amused expression flicker over Itachi's face. It was brief but enough for Naruto to wonder if he was trapped in some kind of genjutsu.

"I am not here for that, Naruto-kun," Itachi said. His voice was faintly raspy, as if he wasn't used to using it, though Naruto supposed that if Itachi was anything like his brother then he wasn't one for talking much.

"Oh good," Naruto said, though his paranoia didn't fade in the slightest. "What do you want then?"

"Do you think you'll be able to save him?" Itachi asked.

Naruto was momentarily thrown. "Who?" he asked.

"Sasuke," Itachi replied. The name sounded odd coming from him, so did the faint hint of concern.

Naruto mentally chalked this up as his weirdest conversation ever.

"Yes," he said firmly. "I'll save him or die trying."

Itachi tilted his head to one side, slightly. "What if he is the one who needs to die?" he asked.

Naruto glared at him. "It won't come to that," he growled.

Itachi didn't press the issue. "The Akatsuki is run by a man called Uchiha Madara," he said. "He was my teacher, and he will seek Sasuke to replace me." Itachi paused to cough, and continued when he had recovered. "He wants to create an ultimate Jinchuuriki that will be loyal only to him; the Bijuu are stronger when they have hosts, after all. He knows something pertaining to the Bijuu that gives him confidence that it is possible to seal them all in one vessel."

"Why are you telling me this?" Naruto asked.

"Everything I have done has been for Konoha and my brother," Itachi said quietly. "Madara will go after Sasuke once I am dead, and he will come for you. You cannot allow him to get either Sasuke or the Kyuubi."

Itachi took a step forward, but Naruto found he couldn't move. He'd been frozen in place by the crazy talk of a renowned psychopath.

"You have to know more about the Bijuu you are defending before you can take on the rest of the Akatsuki," Itachi said. "You have to learn all you can before war breaks out."

"Then how do I do it?" Naruto asked.

"You must go to a place called Enmugakure," Itachi told him.

"But…hey, does this place even exist?" Naruto asked.

"Not any more," Itachi admitted. "But there is a survivor who can take you to the ruins. You will find what you need there."

"If you know so much then why can't you tell me about the Bijuu yourself?" Naruto demanded, but there was no reply. Itachi's body dissolved into a murder of crows, and Naruto found himself gagging as another crow forced its way out of his mouth to join its fellows in wheeling above the training ground.

"I have given you half of my power," Itachi's voice whispered, half drowned out by the rustling of the trees and the flapping of wings. "Use it well, Naruto-kun. Save Sasuke."

The crows vanished, and Naruto dropped to his knees. Instead of feeling stronger, he felt drained and shaky. "What the hell?" he wondered out loud.

He shook his head as if to clear it, and looked back up at the darkening sky. "I'd better tell grandma about this, I guess," he whispered into the breeze.

* * *

Tsunade's reaction, when the murder of crows soared through her window and melded themselves together to form Konoha's most infamous missing-nin, was to spit a mouthful of sake all over her paperwork.

Uchiha Itachi ignored the fine spray of alcohol that landed on his cloak, and stared down at her with expressionless black eyes. He hadn't activated his Sharingan, and that was the only thing that stopped Tsunade from beating the crap out of him then and there.

"What do you want?" she demanded.

"I have left a message with Naruto-kun," Itachi said tonelessly, and Tsunade's breath caught in her throat. "He is unharmed. I have given him a task that will ensure the fall of the Akatsuki, however, I know he must receive your sanction Hokage-sama before he completes it."

Tsunade leaned back in her chair and poured herself another cup of sake; one that she sipped carefully lest it end up soaking into her paperwork just like the last. "How do I know this isn't some sort of really bizarre trap?" she asked.

"Because if I were loyal to the Akatsuki, Naruto-kun would be dead," Itachi told her.

Tsunade sighed. "Right," she said. She rubbed her eyes tiredly and took another sip of her drink. "Why are you doing this?"

"The Akatsuki must not succeed," Itachi said. "And, perhaps, I wish to openly do something for Konoha one last time."

She looked at him closely. She knew she was looking at an illusion – she doubted Itachi could really tear his body apart to form a murder of crows – but she couldn't suppress the medic's instinct to examine a patient closely.

"Tuberculosis," Itachi said helpfully, and she nodded. He was dying then; slowly and painfully wasting away.

"Ignoring the fact that you're a member of Akatsuki, Konoha's best known missing-nin and a mass murderer who slaughtered his entire family for no apparent reason…can I trust you, Uchiha? Are you completely serious about this?"

She looked up at his blank face and realised that he was a man who never joked about anything. She didn't take back her question, however, and the words hung between them.

"You can trust me, Hokage-sama," he said eventually.

She nodded. "Then I'll give Naruto my sanction," she said. "Is there anything else I should know?"

Itachi nodded. "Naruto-kun will need a guide on this mission and there is only one option," he said. "When you hear the details from him, I suggest you do research. You will know who the guide must be. I only ask that you give him the same faith you have shown me, despite his actions."

She nodded. "It's a deal."

She thought she saw his lips twitch slightly, as if he were about to smile, before he dissolved back into the murder of crows and flew out of her window. A lone black feather drifted down onto her desk, and she glared at it. She was getting the impression that whatever task she'd agreed to set to Naruto was going to make her wish she had more sake in her office.

Mere seconds after Itachi had flown off, the door to her office slammed open and Naruto tore into the room. He came to a stop right in front of her desk, right where Itachi had been standing moments before, and doubled over with his hands on his knees, panting heavily.

In between gasps for breath, he began to talk and she listened, sipping her sake and wishing that she hadn't taken the job of Hokage after all.

"…and then one of his birds was in my mouth…" Naruto rambled.

Tsunade decided that she really didn't want to know. "Naruto, get to the point," she said, massaging her forehead.

Naruto took a deep breath and straightened up. "He says that I've got to go to Enmugakure to find out the secret of the Bijuu so that I can stop Uchiha Madara from creating an ultimate Jinchuuriki that contains all of the Bijuu," he said.

Tsunade bypassed her cup and reached for the sake bottle. "Enmugakure doesn't exist," she said.

"I know!" he said. "I said that! But he said that there was someone who knew where the ruins were, and that I'd find the answers there!" He paused for a moment. "I think he's crazy," he said.

Tsunade wondered if he was being deliberately dense. She sighed again and took another gulp of sake from the bottle.

"I'll research the place he wants you to go to," she said. "You go and get some rest. I have a feeling you're going to need it."

He nodded. "Whatever you say, grandma," he said. "Try not to drink too much, okay?"

She promised nothing.


	2. Puzzle

Disclaimer: See the first chapter

* * *

_Far better, yea, to me it seems to die;  
To set glad lips against the lips of Death--  
The only thing God gives that comforteth,  
The only thing we do not find a lie._

The Land of Illusion

Madison Cawein

Part II

Puzzle

A hand landed on her shoulder, and Tsunade jerked awake. She blinked up at Shizune in confusion; her head still fuzzy with sleep, until the events of the previous night came crashing down on her. She drew her brows together in a frown and sighed, wishing that she could have more sake so that she could try and forget all over again. Then she wrinkled her nose. A toothbrush would probably be better.

A gentle hand peeled away an unrolled scroll that she hadn't noticed had been stuck to her cheek, and she glanced up at Shizune again. She looked worried, and she was studying the scroll intently.

"What is this?" she asked, her words deliberately quiet so she didn't aggravate Tsunade's headache too much.

"A scroll recording a battle that occurred before the first Great War," Tsunade told her. Her voice was dry and raspy, and she reached for the tea Shizune had placed on her desk. "When Suna and Iwa teamed up to annihilate a small shinobi village that lay between their two countries. At the time, no records were taken of anyone who survived. They were wrong. Look at the village symbol."

Shizune did as she said, and her eyes widened in horror. "But that's -"

"I know," Tsunade said. She placed her tea down and stretched her arms above her head, sighing with relief as vertebrae popped back into place.

"What's all this about?" Shizune asked her.

Tsunade sighed. "I'm only going to explain this once, so put the scroll down and send out summons for Naruto, Sakura and Nara Shikamaru."

Shizune looked down at the scroll again. "Do you think it's wise to involve Shikamaru-kun in this?" she asked.

"No," Tsunade admitted. "But we'd be worse off not to."

"Alright then," Shizune said, though she sounded doubtful. She placed the scroll down carefully on Tsunade's desk and left, leaving the Hokage in silence.

Tsunade sipped her tea and stared down at the symbol of Enmugakure: three vertical, wavy lines. She closed her eyes wearily and sighed. "Damn it, Uchiha," she whispered. "If this is a hoax you're going to wish that disease had killed you sooner."

There was no answer.

She had finished her tea and a bowl of miso soup by the time Naruto, Sakura and Shikamaru arrived in her office, and after she spotted Shizune slip in behind them, she cleared her throat to begin.

"I have a mission for the three of you," she said.

"Hey grandma, is this to do with last night?" Naruto asked.

She glared at him. "Yes, now shut up and let me talk, brat," she snapped. He fell silent, though she did notice Sakura sending him quizzical looks. Tsunade waited for her student to realise that she was still waiting to deliver the mission brief before she continued.

"Last night, Naruto and I received intelligence pertaining to the Akatsuki," she said. After…long consideration, I decided that it would be stupid for us not to check it out, despite how improbable it sounds."

She paused, and saw Shikamaru nod slightly. He was thinking over her words carefully, she was glad to see, though he wasn't going to like what she had to say.

"It regards the Bijuu," she said, "and Akatsuki's plans to make an ultimate Jinchuuriki who contains all nine of the tailed demons." They shivered, and she saw something dark stir behind Naruto's eyes. "We cannot allow them to do that, obviously, which is why I'm going to send you to check out our informant's tip off."

"What is the mission, Tsunade-shishou?" Sakura asked.

"You will be sent on an information gathering mission to a place called Enmugakure," Tsunade told them. "It was a hidden village located somewhere between Earth Country and Wind Country that was almost completely destroyed before the first war. Apparently, the ruins of the village hold vital information about the Bijuu, which would give us an advantage in the war against the Akatsuki.

"This is the part you won't like. At the time of the battle, it was thought that there were no survivors. However, we have since discovered that there was one. He will be your guide."

"But you said the village was destroyed before the first Great War," Sakura said. "Surely no one's that old."

She could practically see the pieces of the puzzle fitting together in Shikamaru's mind. Oh yes, there would be fireworks.

"Like I said, there was one survivor and he will be your guide," she said, still looking at Shikamaru. She met his eyes. "You've already met him."

She saw Naruto and Sakura exchange confused looks from the corner of her eye, but she kept her gaze fixed on Shikamaru. She held up the scroll she'd used as a pillow the previous night and showed it to them.

"This is the symbol of the village."

That was all it took. Shikamaru's eyes widened in realisation, and his cheeks flushed with anger. "Are you insane?" he demanded. "You're going to dig up the head of a psychotic serial killer and ask it for directions? With all due respect, Hokage-sama, that is the worst plan I've ever heard."

"Your opinion is noted, Nara," she said, "and I agree with you, but it is the only plan we've got."

He looked away from her and closed his eyes, visibly trying to restrain his temper. "This is so troublesome," he muttered.

Tsunade didn't argue. She decided to clarify for the others. "The survivor in question is Hidan, previously of the Akatsuki," she said. "I'm beginning to suspect that this was the reason why they invited him into their ranks in the first place."

Naruto looked stunned, while Sakura looked sceptical. "Can we even trust him?" she asked.

"Probably not," Tsunade admitted. "But he'll be on his own against the three of you, and one of you has already killed him once already. I don't think he'd push his luck."

* * *

­

The Nara forest was quiet as they walked through it, the only noises being their own footsteps and the twittering of birds. Tsunade thought she spotted a few deer sometimes, but they vanished before she could take a closer look. They were such timid creatures…

But despite the pleasant experience that was their woodland walk, their more macabre purpose dulled the mood. Shikamaru was not reacting well, having thought that his sensei's murderer was done with forever, and he was chain smoking; the tendons in his neck standing out as he tried to suppress his anger.

Naruto and Sakura had taken it better, but Tsunade could see their concern for their friend etched in both their faces. The ANBU team escorting them were indifferent to their purpose. Or at least, she thought that they were; their blank masks hid their feelings well. Actually, they were probably more confused about why she had asked them to bring two empty crates on a trip through the Nara deer reserve.

Then Shikamaru stopped suddenly, and Tsunade looked past him to see a patch of barren earth, still loose from being used to cover the pieces. She sighed, wishing not for the first time that she wasn't making a huge mistake, and waved a hand at the ANBU.

"Get digging," she told them. There was a definite confused look at her words. "You're looking for human body parts," she said. "When you find them, put them in the crates."

They got to work, and Naruto and Sakura joined in to help. Shikamaru didn't, choosing instead to stand next to her and smoke like a chimney.

"I hope you know what you're doing," he said eventually.

"So do I," she replied.

Minutes passed, and all they heard was the sound of the ANBU digging and the twittering of the birds, until there was a yelp from the pit the ANBU, Naruto and Sakura were standing in.

Then, "Shut the hell up, Pinkie. What's the matter? Never seen a severed head before, you stupid bitch?"

"Um, Tsunade-shishou?" Sakura called. She sounded stunned. "I found the head."

"No shit," said the voice, whom Tsunade could only assume was Hidan.

"Bring it here, Sakura," she called back.

Second later, she saw Sakura leap out of the hole and land neatly on the forest floor in front of her. In her hands, she gingerly held the severed head of a silver-haired man. Her face was twisted in an expression of disgust, and Tsunade supposed that while Sakura – as a medic – was used to seeing severed body parts on occasion, she was not used to them talking to her.

Sakura held the head out, and Tsunade took it, turning it so that she could talk to the missing-nin face-to-face. He was, she supposed, pretty handsome despite his foul mouth and the fact that he was missing his body. He was also glaring at Shikamaru from the corner of his eye. Shikamaru was glaring back. Tsunade cleared her throat.

"Are you from Enmugakure?" she asked him.

His violet coloured eyes turned to her and he sneered. "No," he said. "I'm not."

She frowned. "Your hitae-ate…"

"Wasn't originally mine," he said.

Okay… "Do you know where the ruins of the village are?" she asked.

He looked at her oddly. "Yeah."

That was, she supposed, good news. "Good," she said. "In that case, I've got a proposition for you."

He raised an eyebrow, which she took as a cue to continue talking. He was listening, at least, and that was good.

"I'll put your body back together," she said. "If you lead a team of my shinobi to Enmugakure and back again, and promise not to rejoin Akatsuki."

He blinked at her. "Why the fuck would I want to rejoin those miserable bastards?" he asked, and she supposed that that was a good thing. "And what the fuck do you want with Enmu? There's nothing there except dust and corpses."

She sighed. "We were told that we could find information about the Bijuu there," she told him.

"Who told you that?" he demanded.

"Uchiha Itachi," she told him, and from the corner of her eye she saw Shikamaru give her an incredulous look. She hadn't mentioned that earlier.

Hidan gave a low whistle. "Fuck," he said simply. "What if I refuse? Are you going to kill me?"

He sounded almost hopeful. Then again, Tsunade would admit that death would be infinitely better than being buried alive.

"I'll just toss your head back into that pit and get my ANBU to bury you again," she told him.

He scowled. "Fine," he said. "You've got yourself a fucking deal. And don't forget my rosary and my hitae-ate, alright? And don't leave me dickless either."

Tsunade placed his head in one of the crates. Putting him back together was going to be a very long task.

* * *

In the end she got Sakura and Shizune to help her sort through the pieces of Hidan's body, clean them and put them in some semblance of order. Hidan was pretty vocal at first, but he eventually shut up. When he did fall quiet, Tsunade turned to look worriedly at the head – thinking incredulously that he might actually have died – only to find him sleeping soundly, soft whispery snores falling from his lips.

How he could snore when and talk when he wasn't actually attached to his lungs or vocal chords was beyond her. He was some sort of medical miracle in addition to being a freak of nature.

When they had identified all of the pieces and washed the soil off them, she sent Shizune out to get clothes in Hidan's size. She wouldn't let him wander around stark naked, no matter how physically attractive he was. She also ordered Shikamaru and Naruto to find him weapons like his old ones. Shikamaru had initially objected, but it was only really hot air. He knew that she knew that he knew that they would have a better chance of getting through the mission unscathed if Hidan was armed and capable of holding his own.

She also sent Rock Lee to Suna with a message saying that she would be sending a team through their country, with a general summary of the team's purpose. Lee returned two days before she and Sakura finished piecing Hidan back together again. The message he brought back said that the Kazekage would be sending an escort to meet them at a small border town, and that he wished them luck.

She was pretty sure that was code for 'you're all crazy'.

Then, five days after Uchiha Itachi had betrayed the Akatsuki, Hidan was whole again and the team was ready.

And Tsunade still had no idea if she was doing the right thing


	3. A Priest of Jashin

Disclaimer: See the first chapter.

AN: Many thanks to 'wrong light' for correcting my geography. Enmugakure is located somewhere between Wind Country and Earth Country; not Lightning. The previous chapter has been edited to correct that.

* * *

_Better to die, and sleep  
The never-waking sleep, than linger on  
And dare to live when the soul's life is gone._

Ajax

Sophocles

Part III

A Priest of Jashin

Shikamaru was beginning to develop a grudging respect for Kakuzu. Even though he hated the man, and was glad that he was dead, he couldn't deny that to have spent so long travelling with Hidan, he must have had a lot more patience than Shikamaru.

It had occurred to him that while he did have a great deal of patience himself, he had none for Hidan, and that was what made the difference. His hatred of the man burned away at his usual laidback attitude and created a tense atmosphere that even Naruto was aware of.

Not that Naruto liked Hidan either; Shikamaru doubted that any of them did. His foul mouth, arrogance and bad attitude was grating on all of them. Especially Sakura, who, for some reason that Shikamaru couldn't quite fathom, had taken it upon herself to heal him after every ritual he performed. And Hidan performed a lot of rituals; Shikamaru suspected that he was trying to make up for lost time.

If it had been anyone other than Hidan, Shikamaru would have wondered at the kind of dedication ritually stabbing himself through the heart at least twice a day must have taken. As it was Hidan, he just hoped that the ritual suicide would be successful one day and that he would get to watch.

They all reacted to the tense atmosphere around their group in different ways. Shikamaru, as the one responsible for creating it, barely noticed it, and Hidan mostly ignored it – only lowering himself to giving Shikamaru a shit-eating grin once in a while. Sakura looked between them nervously, though she was prone to ranting at Hidan around the times of his rituals, at which point he would scoff and tell her that she knew "jack shit about Jashin-sama" and tell her to "shut the fuck up".

Naruto, of course, responded by babbling inanely about everything and anything that came to mind, which was almost as annoying as Hidan's existence.

The slow pace – only made so slow by Hidan's incessant rituals an Sakura's bizarre need to patch him up afterwards – was grating on Shikamaru's nerves. It was taking them twice as long as it should have to get to Wind Country, and he could only suspect that the rest of the journey would continue in a similar vein.

On their third night on the road – by which point, Shikamaru reminded himself, they should be meeting with the Suna escort – after Hidan's ritual, they sat moodily round a campfire, listening to Naruto ramble on about nothing while Sakura made stew.

"So, uh, Hidan-san," she said, not quite looking at him as she stirred the food. "Do you know what we're looking for?"

"Your Hokage told me," he replied.

Shikamaru looked up from the stick he was using to poke the fire – stab, actually, but the others didn't comment on it – and frowned at him. "We know she did," he said. "What Sakura was asking was if you knew this secret of the Bijuu that we're supposed to be looking for."

Hidan's eyes shone strangely in the firelight, and he leaned back against a tree. The pendant of his rosary glowed red, reflecting the light from the fire, and Shikamaru found himself staring at it.

"That depends on how batshit Uchiha went before he decided to pass on the message," he said. "He could be talking about something I have no fucking clue about."

"But you know something," Sakura prompted.

"Pinkie, when you get to my age, knowing 'something' is pretty fucking unavoidable."

It was another thing that made Hidan irritating as all hell. He could be amazingly vague when he wanted to be, and it was driving Shikamaru mad. He was usually good at reading people, but in Hidan's case he found it nearly impossible.

He heard Sakura growl in irritation, and barely stopped her from smacking the man. "We need him alive, Sakura," he reminded her.

Hidan snorted. "Pretty fucking hard to get me any other way," he said.

Shikamaru caught the bitter note in his voice, and his frown deepened. Perhaps there was something behind the vigorous enthusiasm with which Hidan performed his rituals.

"How old are you, anyway?" Naruto asked, speaking for the first time since their conversation began. He'd shut up as soon as he'd heard a voice that wasn't his own.

Hidan seemed to think about it. "A hundred and forty," he said. "Close to that, at least."

"You said that your hitae-ate wasn't originally yours," Shikamaru said. "Whose was it?"

"It belonged to an Enmu shinobi," Hidan said, deliberately vague once more. Shikamaru felt like strangling him. Instead he lit up a cigarette and took a deep drag. He saw Sakura wrinkle her nose, but he didn't care.

"So…you weren't always a shinobi?" Naruto asked. "I mean, you must have picked that up after the village was destroyed, so what did you do before that?"

"I was a priest of the great Jashin-sama, you fucking heathen," Hidan replied. "Still am. 'S just that the whole ninja thing makes getting a hold of sacrifices easier."

Shikamaru couldn't hold back his furious glare. His sensei had been one of those 'sacrifices'. Hidan saw the expression on his face and rolled his eyes.

"Shit, kid, get the fuck over it," he said. "So I killed your sensei. Big fucking deal. You'll get to see him again whenever you decide to put yourself out of your fucking misery."

Shikamaru wondered if that was Hidan's way of comforting people. If it was then it was terrible. All the same, it was interesting that he spoke with the same bitter tone as he had done when he'd mentioned his apparent immortality.

Did Hidan want to die?

The other two – even Naruto – seemed to have noticed it too. Whatever appetite for conversation that they'd managed to muster up had died a miserable death, and they spent the rest of the night in silence, each of them lost in their own thoughts.

The next day, Shikamaru kept a closer eye on Hidan. He had tried to avoid doing so before, but on some sick level, he wanted to know what made Hidan tick.

He came to his conclusion pretty easily. While Hidan spent most of his time with a cocky smirk on his lips, it was just a mask. The only time he saw the barest flicker of anything close to happiness in Hidan's eyes was when he was performing his rituals; the moment before he plunged his pike through his own heart.

The sight of it made Shikamaru sick. It wasn't because of the blood or the fact that it was someone effectively committing suicide; it wasn't even because of the way it reminded him of his sensei's death. It was because he could see that while Hidan's body was immortal and eternally young – the dream of most of the Akatsuki and Orochimaru – his soul was dead.

And Shikamaru was pretty sure that that was even worse than dying young.


	4. An Inn in a Market Town

Disclaimer: See the first chapter.

* * *

_"Anger and jealousy can no more bear to lose sight of their objects than love."_

The Mill on the Floss

George Eliot

Part IV

An Inn in a Market Town

They reached Arenotoshi three days after leaving Konoha. It was the border town that they due to meet their Suna escort at, and they were supposed to have been there around two days ago.

It was a small town, hidden behind high walls. The walls were used not only to defend the town from the strong winds and sand storms that the country was famous for, but had also been used to try and defend it from foreign shinobi in times of unrest. It was, however, primarily a market town and the atmosphere inside reflected that. It was a happy, busy place filled with delicious smells and fascinating stalls.

If they hadn't been so late, Shikamaru might have been tempted to let Sakura have a look round at the stalls she wasn't quite unable to stop looking at – he had learned that a happy woman was less troublesome to deal with than an unhappy one, especially when the woman in question could send you through a wall with a flick to the forehead – or let Naruto get something hot to eat. However, they were late, and he was unwilling to risk irritating their Suna escort even more.

So he guided them through the crowded streets, ducking past sales men enthusiastically shoving their wares in their faces, and the busy shoppers who dodged between them looking for bargains. They passed fine silks, spices, more food stalls than he would have imagined – including some that sold something that looked like a barbecued lizard on a stick – stalls that sold glassware, and some that sold beautiful jewellery made from precious stones, glass beads and precious metals. There were stalls that sold shinobi gear, and others that sold exotic outfits.

It was a place Ino would love, Shikamaru thought.

But they had no time to look, so he headed straight for the inn they were set to meet their escort at. He had to drag Sakura past a stall that sold elaborate outfits made of silk, glass beads and coins that would leave very little to the imagination when worn, and march Naruto past a ramen stand.

Hidan, for once, said nothing. He wasn't even sneering, and Shikamaru wasn't sure whether to take that as a sign of nostalgia or a sign of the apocalypse. He wasn't going to take any chances.

He breathed a sigh of relief when the sign of the inn – sticking out from a wall high above the winding street, indicating a narrow doorway into a building that looked exactly the same as all of the others – came into view. He could sit down. He could drink something that wasn't slightly stale-tasting water. He would be able to get some sleep in a proper bed.

"In here," he told the others.

"Are you sure?" Sakura asked.

Shikamaru sighed. "Yes," he told her.

"This place has changed a lot, seriously," Hidan said, speaking up for the first time since they entered the town. "It's a lot more crowded. Too many fucking people."

Shikamaru ignored him. He hadn't heard of a time, outside of war, that this place hadn't been bustling with traders and buzzing with gossip, so whenever Hidan had been here last had probably been outside of living memory.

"What was it like last time you were here?" Naruto asked, unable to keep his curiosity to himself. Shikamaru saw Sakura listening in from the corner of his eye, and he sighed. It was too troublesome to start thinking of Hidan as anything other than a murderous psychopath. The rare moments of actual humanity he showed set Shikamaru on edge; he didn't want to think of him as anything other than his sensei's murderer.

"This quarter was still being built," Hidan said.

Meaning he'd last been here roughly eighty years ago, if Shikamaru's historical knowledge was correct.

He was glad when he reached the top of the narrow slanting stairs that led up from the street-level door, and entered the main bar. It was quieter than the street below, though there was still a buzz of chatter. The ceiling was shrouded in aromatic smoke coming from both the smoking patrons and sticks of incense placed in strategic places around the room. The patrons were seated on thick cushions around low tables, sipping tea.

And there, at a table at the back of the bar, with a glass mug of cooling tea by her elbow, was Temari.

Shikamaru found himself smiling. It was a sign of how quickly Suna had recovered from the Akatsuki attack if Gaara could free her from her political duties long enough to escort them. He headed towards her, and when Sakura and Naruto caught sight of her, they cheered up considerably.

Hidan, on the other hand, stopped dead in his tracks. Shikamaru turned to look at him curiously, only to see that he was staring at Temari with wide eyes; his face pale.

"Come on," Shikamaru said, his words sounding harsher than he had intended. He didn't like the way that Hidan's gaze was fixed unblinkingly on Temari's face.

"Who the hell is she?" Hidan asked him.

Shikamaru ignored him, and continued to the table, dropping down onto a cushion opposite Temari. Sakura and Naruto had already claimed the cushions on either side of her, and were enthusiastically asking her about herself and her brothers.

"We're fine," she said, laughing off their questions. "We're all doing fine." She paused, looking up at Hidan, who Shikamaru had just dragged down onto a cushion. She looked at Shikamaru questioningly. "Who's the cutie?" she asked.

Shikamaru frowned at her question. He knew that she had every right to ask who, exactly, Hidan was, but the way she had worded it bothered him.

"This is Hidan," he said. "He's our guide. Hidan, this is the Suna escort Temari. The Kazekage's sister."

He finished his introduction with a meaningful glare, which Hidan ignored. Shikamaru wondered if he'd even registered it. Hidan was still looking at Temari as if he'd seen a ghost.

She was looking back, her gaze fixed on the Enmu hitae-ate tied around Hidan's neck.

"You're from Enmu?" she asked. "But that's impossible. You're way too young."

Hidan recovered from his surprise at her appearance – mysterious as it was – and leered. "I'm immortal, Temari-chan," he said, drawing out her name and making a blush rise up in her cheeks.

Shikamaru glared at him. Sakura frowned, looking between the three of them, and Naruto – as usual – looked completely oblivious to the tension rising in their group once more.

"Is that so," Temari asked. "How did you manage that?" She leaned forward slightly, her lips curving into a smile. Naruto noticed that, and raised an eyebrow at Shikamaru.

"Trade secret," Hidan purred.

Shikamaru hadn't realised that Hidan could make his voice sound like that. Sakura raised a hand to cover her mouth, and Shikamaru would have bet a month's wages that she was grinning. There was a certain curve and shine to her eyes that reminded him of her sensei.

And then Temari glanced at him, and he forced himself to calm down. He had, he knew, no right to be jealous of her talking to anyone, even if the sight of her talking to Hidan made him want to blow the man up into tiny pieces all over again.

"So," she said. "What's our route?"

She reached beneath the table and pulled out a map, which she unfolded over the table, shoving her cooling tea to one side.

The map was the most detailed on Wind Country Shikamaru had ever seen, which was fitting as Temari was a Wind Country native. Hidan craned his neck to try and see it the right way up, and Temari elbowed Naruto in the ribs.

"Switch places," she told him, indicating Hidan.

"Temari," Shikamaru said. "I'm not sure that's…"

"Sure," Naruto chirped, standing up almost immediately. When he sat down again next to Shikamaru, he leaned in close and whispered in Shikamaru's ear. "Relax. Temari can take care of herself."

He was right, Shikamaru knew, and he knew that Hidan needed access to the map.

"Huh," Hidan was saying. "I could have sworn that oasis wasn't there before. Damn fucking desert changes too much."

Temari snorted. "Well you definitely aren't from Wind, that's for sure," she observed. "That oasis sprung up during the last Great War. A jutsu blast brought an underground spring to the surface."

Hidan nodded. "We can stop there," he said. "It's on the way, and there's nothing fucking worse than a trek through the desert without a break."

"Not like you can die of dehydration," Shikamaru mumbled.

Hidan looked up at him. "Doesn't make it a fucking walk in the park," he replied. Then he bent his head close to Temari's again, and they began debating about something near the border.

Shikamaru waved one the waitresses over. She was dressed in some sort of skimpy silk outfit in shades of red and deep orange, with coins hanging from the hem of the top over her flat stomach. She jingled as she walked.

"A pot of tea," he ordered. "Four mugs."

She smiled at him and nodded. He sighed and rested his elbows on the table, looking at the map Temari was emphatically stabbing with a finger. It was going to be a very long day.


	5. Scorpion

Disclaimer: See the first chapter.

AN: Sorry about the delay in updating. I was on holiday and without access to a computer.

* * *

_He drew a circle that shut me out--  
Heretic, rebel, a thing to flout.  
But Love and I had the wit to win:  
We drew a circle that took him in._

Outwitted

Edwin Markham

Part V

Scorpion

Even as a native of Wind Country, Temari couldn't help but be in awe of the desert she had grown up in. Or perhaps it was because she had grown up in it and knew the extent of its destructive power, that she respected it as much as she did.

The desert outside of the walls of Arenotoshi was vast. It stretched on as far as the eye could see; rolling dunes of red sand and a cloudless blue sky, lit by the swelteringly hot sun. On the horizon, the air shimmered, creating the haze that had given its name to the village they were seeking.

"This is so troublesome," she heard Shikamaru mutter under his breath. No doubt he was dreading the trek across the sands, lazy bum that he was.

"How long did you say the journey would take?" Sakura asked. Temari tore her eyes away from the desert and looked at her over her shoulder.

"Two weeks, give or take a few days," she said. "Allowing for rest, religious rituals, and a small detour via an oasis for comfort's sake."

She didn't miss the scowl Shikamaru shot in Hidan's direction at the mention of his rituals. She had to bite her tongue to stop herself from asking what that was about. Shikamaru obviously had some kind of history with this Hidan guy that she didn't know about, and as much as she wanted to pry, Shikamaru's life wasn't really her business.

Hidan either didn't notice the glare, or he was so used to them that it made no difference to him whatsoever. Temari would bet on the latter. Instead, he looked straight ahead, in the direction that Temari had been staring just moments before, with a strange look on his face. Temari supposed that this was going to be like some kind of bizarre, long-due homecoming for him. Even if he wasn't originally from Enmu, then he definitely had some kind of tie to the village if he so proudly wore its hitae-ate.

She took a moment to study the planes and angles of his features, the colour of his hair and eyes. When she had called him a cutie at their first meeting, she hadn't been lying or doing so just to make Shikamaru jealous – not that he should be; he had Ino now, after all – she had been honest. He was gorgeous, in a pale and sinister sort of way. She hadn't missed the way he kept staring at her, either – and she knew that Shikamaru had noticed that and was more bothered by it than anything else – as if he knew her.

She knew that that thought was ridiculous, though; she would have remembered meeting someone like Hidan.

She realised that he was looking back at her, and she turned away. "Let's go," she said. "The quicker we get moving, the quicker that we'll get there."

* * *

She sat on her cloak on the rapidly cooling sand as Shikamaru and Naruto built the fire, and Sakura looked through their packs for food. Shikamaru was smoking, and Temari wondered when he'd picked up his sensei's disgusting habit. She was almost glad that he'd chosen Ino; at least she wouldn't have to kiss someone who tasted like an ash tray.

It hadn't escaped her that the others were carefully ignoring what Hidan was doing, though Sakura did grumble about it under her breath every so often. Temari, on the other hand, was more than happy to ignore the building of the fire and the search through their ration packs in order to watch him.

He was dancing. Well, almost. It looked like a dance – a deadly one – with him moving elegantly over the sand in set patterns, a pike gripped loosely in one hand. Every so often, as he moved, he would dip the point of the pike downwards to score a line in the desert sands. He was drawing some sort of pattern, Temari realised, though she couldn't see what it was from where she was sitting.

His violet eyes were closed, and she realised that he didn't need to look at what he was doing. He had memorised the movements so long ago that the actual number of years would probably make Temari's head spin.

He'd taken his shirt and cloak off, and they now lay on the sand next to Temari's own gear. When Sakura reached for Temari's pack, no doubt to search through it for something to go with the other food that she had gathered together, she avoided touching the garments completely. Temari, on the other hand, kept her eyes fixed on the play of strong, wiry muscles under milk-pale skin, highlighted by the setting desert sun.

His rosary shone red against his bare chest in the dying sunlight. The blade of his pike flashed ominously as it dipped down again in another sweeping stroke. Hidan turned, raised the pike again, and plunged it through his own chest. Temari gasped, staring at the silhouette of his body against the sunset.

He turned his head to look at her, and she could see blood trickling from the corner of his mouth. He smirked at her, though she couldn't see any of his apparent smugness reflected in his eyes.

After a moment, he yanked the pike out of his chest, and arterial spray splattered over the sand.

Then he turned towards their camp fully, and began to walk over. Blood oozed down his chest, and dripped from the tip of his pike. He wiped his bloody mouth on the back of his hand, and made a show of licking it off. He did the same with the blood flowing down his abdomen, though Temari could see as he approached that he wasn't bleeding nearly as much or as quickly as he should have been. The flow of blood was actually slowing down.

He sat on his cloak next to her, and cleaned the blade of his pike on the sand, leaving smears of dark heart-blood in the dust.

He looked back at her and raised an eyebrow. "See something you like, blondie?" he asked.

"It's Temari," she corrected him automatically. "And…yes, actually. The ritual was impressive."

Surprise flickered over his face. "Well shit," he said. "I wasn't expecting that."

Temari grinned at him. "I'm just full of surprises," she told him.

"You shouldn't encourage him," Sakura interrupted, shooting Temari a glare as she abandoned their now cooking food in order to heal Hidan's chest. Temari watched as the green healing chakra moulded itself around her hands and flowed into the wounds, and briefly wished that she could do something like that.

Hidan snorted. "Your little medic spiel isn't going to stop me from doing something I've been doing since before your fucking grandfather was born, pinkie," he said.

Sakura glared at him, but said nothing. Temari got the impression that they'd had this conversation before.

"Does your heart stop beating?" she found herself asking him. "When you stab it, I mean."

"No," he replied, and she couldn't help but notice how bitter he sounded about it.

As if that was some sort of cue, Naruto started talking about nothing in particular, rambling to try and cover up the awkward atmosphere that her question had created. She could practically see the tension radiating from Shikamaru as he lit up yet another of those god-forsaken cigarettes.

Sakura lowered her hands from Hidan's chest and the green glow of her chakra faded. She rubbed her arms and inched back towards the fire. "It's cold," she complained.

"The desert's always cold at night," Temari told her. "You'll get used to it."

She watched from the corner of her eye as Hidan used a handful of sand to scrub away what was left of the blood on his stomach before dusting himself off and pulling his black shirt back on. He left it mostly open, leaving an enticing view of the pale skin of his chest and his rosary in plain sight.

She'd never seen anyone as pale as him before. She told herself that that was part of the attraction she felt for him; the fact that she had never seen, let alone met, anyone quite like him before. He wasn't like Shikamaru, either, and that was another reason.

He leaned back, to rest his weight on his hands and frowned. When he pulled one of his hands forward again, she saw a small, shiny black scorpion gripped between his fingers. Its stinger was buried in his hand, and she recognised it immediately as one of the more lethal breeds. She had seen men die from one sting, and she couldn't stop herself from reaching towards her pack and the anti-venom that it held.

Hidan killed the scorpion swiftly, crushing its fragile body in his fist with a crunch. Then he pulled its stinger out of his hand and flung the tiny corpse into the flames.

"Fuck that stings," he muttered. The wound was already beginning to swell.

He lifted his hand to his mouth and began to suck out the poison. He waved away Temari and her vial of anti-venom with his uninjured hand, and rolled his eyes at her. After he spat a mouthful of blood and poison onto the sand, he looked up at her. "Don't fucking waste it," he told her. "I'll live."

Temari put the vial away slowly, watching as he resumed sucking at his hand. She felt stupid. She'd just watched him stab himself through the heart, and she was worried about him getting stung by a scorpion?

Shikamaru was watching her, and she couldn't read the expression on his face. She slid the small vial back into its pouch in her pack, and started when she felt a hand touch her arm. She looked round to see that the hand belonged to Hidan; his long fingers looked impossibly white compared to her deep desert tan.

"Thanks anyway," he said.

She smiled and nodded. On the other side of the campfire, Shikamaru finished his cigarette and immediately lit up another one, his gaze fixed on Hidan's hand on her arm.


	6. Origins

**Disclaimer:** See the first chapter.

**AN:** This has been a long time in coming. I was delayed by real life and other plot bunnies. This hasn't been abandoned, though. In fact I've just figured out the ending. XD

* * *

_One impulse from a vernal wood_

_May teach you more of man;_

_Of moral evil and of good,_

_Than all the sages can._

The Tables Turned

William Wordsworth

Part VI

Origins

Naruto hated the desert. He hadn't before this mission; he'd found it wild and impressive, but that had only been the impression he had gained while racing towards Suna to rescue Gaara. He hadn't had to spend much time in the desert then. He hadn't had to suffer the cold nights and the harsh winds that had given the country its name; he hadn't even thought of how unbearable the heat was back then, how the sun glared down at them from the blue, blue sky and made them sweaty and achy within minutes. He hadn't worried about snakes or scorpions or sandstorms. He hadn't even been bothered by the fact that sand, whether it was being whipped up by violent winds or not, managed to get everywhere. He had sand in places that he hadn't even known existed before this damn mission.

He didn't know how the people of Suna managed.

Before he'd set off on this mission, he'd thought that Kankuro's outfit – the black cat suit with the freaky cat ear things on the hood – was a pretty stupid outfit form someone who lived in a desert. He'd since admitted that he'd been wrong: that cat suit – dodgy ear-things or not – sounded like paradise compared to the synthetic and far too warm material of his jumpsuit.

He found himself glancing at Temari a lot as they walked. She didn't seem bothered by the sand or the heat, something which probably came from a childhood spent in the desert, though she did look tired. Everyone looked tired, even Hidan, and he'd proved himself to have an almost insane amount of stamina; enough to rival Naruto himself.

Then again, he supposed, at least half of their exhaustion could be attributed to the tension between them all. Most of the tension came from Shikamaru, who'd been pissed off about the mission before they'd even left Konoha. Travelling with someone that he seemed to hate more than anything else in the world – including exercise, and everyone knew that Shikamaru was a lazy bastard – through a damned desert for a week had strained his temper to snapping point. He was, if Naruto was completely honest with himself, acting like a complete dick.

Then again, Hidan had killed Asuma: Shikamaru's sensei. He had every right to be pissed off, even if he had already had his revenge.

But the tension wasn't just coming from Shikamaru. Sakura was annoyed with the heat and the slow pace and the fact that her clothes – not in the slightest bit suited to desert life – were chafing in places Naruto was trying not to think about. She was sick of healing Hidan after his rituals – though why she bothered when the guy wouldn't die, he had no idea – and she was sick of walking.

Naruto didn't blame her. He was sick of walking too, sick of the desert and the heat and the sand. He was on edge travelling with an ex-member of Akatsuki, even though Hidan hadn't tried anything since Tsunade had stuck him back together again. He was sick of the tension that surrounded them – more volatile than the sand storms that Temari had warned them about – which had made the general atmosphere more awkward than Sai in a social setting.

Temari, poor girl, had no idea what was going on. None of them had taken it upon themselves to enlighten her as to how, exactly, they had met Hidan. None of them had wanted to face her wrath after telling her that their guide had been part of the organisation that had killed her baby brother – even if said baby brother had managed to be resurrected. But then again, she was part of the reason for a good measure of the irritation that was pouring off Shikamaru like heat from the sun.

Naruto hadn't been the only person who kept glancing at her, and he had been doing it for way more innocent reasons.

And that brought him onto Hidan. Hidan: the foul-mouthed bastard that they were trusting – n the recommendation of Uchiha Itachi of all people – to guide them through the desert on a mission that was, frankly, completely insane.

He was immortal, good looking – according to Temari, at least – dangerous, violent, religious to the point of being a zealot and he looked far, far too calm about their situation. Naruto glowered at his back as he walked, wondering how on earth he was managing to keep going in his tight shinobi pants, his open shirt that revealed a lot more of him than Naruto was interested in seeing, and with such a huge scythe slung over his back. Not to mention that his clothes were black. He had to be swelteringly hot, but Naruto hadn't even seen him break a sweat.

He also seemed impervious to the glares that most of their company – Naruto included – kept sending his way. Naruto envied him that. If he had that ability then he knew that their journey would be far less…awkward. He wouldn't end up babbling to try and cover up the silences that fell over their group; wouldn't have to deal with Sakura's irritated looks every time he opened his mouth just because he couldn't cope with the tension.

They had, he decided, been completely mad to trust Uchiha Itachi. Tsunade hadn't been thinking; he hadn't been thinking. Itachi had obviously cracked a long time ago and then continued to fall apart over the years. Hell, even Hidan had admitted that Itachi was most likely insane, and that said a lot.

At noon, on the seventh day of their journey through Wind Country's endless desert, Naruto found himself walking straight into Hidan's back. His nose smacked into the handle of the three-bladed scythe and he staggered backwards, clutching his face as tears automatically filled his eyes from the blow. Hidan had stopped dead in his tracks while Naruto had been lost in thought – mental bitching about the desert, again – and hadn't even twitched when Naruto had run into him.

Naruto glared at Hidan's back from between his fingers. He had a naturally slender build, and it was easy to forget that under the clothing he had really, really impressive muscle tone. It had felt like walking into a brick wall.

"Why have we stopped?" Sakura asked. Her voice was dry and raspy, and she coughed slightly after her question to try and clear her throat. She grimaced. Naruto wondered if she'd managed to get sand in her throat somehow; it sounded like she had.

"Use your fucking eyes, pinkie," Hidan said. Sakura bristled automatically, and Naruto lowered his hands from his face in order to grab onto her forearm to stop her from hitting the bastard. He shook his head wearily when she looked at him. He didn't have the energy to put up with fighting as well as this tension.

"We're at the fucking oasis," Hidan continued. Naruto moved to peer around Hidan's body, dragging Sakura with him. She stumbled, looked at him ruefully, but followed. True to Hidan's word, just ten feet away from them was the glorious glitter of the bluest water Naruto had ever seen shining through gaps between trees and flowering shrubbery. The water was the colour of the sky overhead, the greenery was lush and it all looked absolutely wonderful.

A rough bark of laughter burst from his throat – it had been far, far too long since he had last laughed – and he started to run, dragging Sakura behind him. He didn't know where the energy had come from; he didn't care. There was water. There was actual plant life. There was something to look at that wasn't the shifting red sands of the desert.

They made it to the water in record time, and Naruto finally let go of Sakura's forearm. She sank down onto a boulder – no doubt part of the bedrock that had been dislodged by the jutsu blast that had created this place – and gave a soft sigh.

"It's beautiful," she said quietly.

Naruto ignored her, going straight to the water to the water to test its temperature. It felt wonderfully cold against his overheated skin and he groaned in pleasure. He would definitely have to take a swim at some point.

"It is beautiful," Temari said.

He glanced back to see that the others had caught up with them. Shikamaru looked slightly less sullen than he had before, Temari was smiling widely – teal eyes shining and her white teeth contrasting against her tanned skin – and Hidan was propping his scythe up against his tree and watching her out of the corner of his eye.

"Most oases are like this," she continued, stepping forward to join Naruto at the water's edge. "Sometimes villages are built up around them, especially along trade routes, but this one managed to escape that. We don't really trade with Earth Country."

She left out the fact that they had traded with them before the last Great War, when they'd ended up on different sides.

Sakura nodded. "It's like a little bit of home in the middle of the desert," she said. She tiled her head back and closed her eyes, letting a smile flitter over her lips. It had been the first smile Naruto had seen her wear since before they had left Konoha and he found himself remembering why he had developed a crush on Sakura in the first place.

Temari said nothing to that.

"How long will we be staying here?" Shikamaru asked.

"We planned for two nights," Temari said, glancing at Hidan, who nodded in silent agreement. "To give you guys a break."

Naruto almost felt offended that they were being pandered to by someone like Hidan, but he knew that it made sense. They weren't used to desert travel, unlike Temari, and they weren't immortal like Hidan either. And, whether he wanted to admit it or not, he did need a break. They all did.

Shikamaru grunted in acknowledgement of the statement and dropped his pack onto the loamy ground. Further down to the water, where Naruto crouched and Temari stood, the loam gave way to sand again. Red, desert sand, but Naruto wasn't bothered by it as much as he was by the sand that lay outside of the tree line.

As if they were all of one mind, they began to strip. Naruto was too tired to care that he was getting undressed in the presence of two very beautiful kunoichi – while he didn't fancy Temari, he wasn't blind – or that they were doing the same so close to him. He knew that he would probably be embarrassed later, but he didn't care. He was more interested in getting into the water and getting the dust and grime that had accumulated on his skin off.

He felt kind of glad that Jiraiya wasn't there. His sensei would have made things even more awkward.

Temari was the first in the water. She waded out, completely naked, showing off a surprisingly uniform tan, and sank into the water. She turned back to them; her nudity obscured by the glittering blue water, and waved them in.

The water was blissful. After bathing, which was a priority for all of them, they swam and messed about. The tension that had been irritating Naruto for the entire journey evaporated and they stayed relaxed even after they clambered out and dried off.

A campfire was lit and as they sat around it, Shikamaru smoking and the girls brushing out their damp hair – Naruto had never seen Temari with her hair down before, and she suited it; Hidan seemed to think so too, if the way that he was watching her meant anything – Naruto couldn't help but think that maybe, somehow, they'd all managed to bond. The quiet, for once, was not awkward.

"So," Temari said eventually. She looked at Hidan, caught his eye and pinned him with her gaze. To his credit, Hidan did look slightly intimidated. Apparently immortality didn't make Temari any less intimidating. "This big secret that we're meant to be searching for. Do you know it?"

He frowned. "Like I told the others," he said, "I have no idea what Itachi was talking about when he mentioned it to the Hokage. He could have been talking about anything; could have made it up off the top of his head."

"He seemed serious," Naruto interjected.

Hidan shrugged. "He's always fucking serious," he said.

"I'm not even going to ask how you ended up on first-name terms with Akatsuki members. But you know something about it, this secret," Temari said calmly. "I know you do."

"Your faith in me is fucking astounding," Hidan said drily.

Shikamaru growled. "Look," he said. "Just tell us what you do know, okay? This is getting irritating as hell."

For a moment, Naruto thought that Hidan wouldn't answer and that their peace would be ruined. That was the last thing he wanted; it was so much better now that they weren't fighting all the time. He found himself hoping that Hidan wouldn't be confrontational. Catching Sakura's eye, he knew that she was thinking the exact same thing.

Hidan heaved a sigh. "How much do you people know about the Bijou?" he asked.

"They're scarily powerful, obsessed with killing and kinda creepy," Naruto said, briefly touching his stomach, just over the seal that kept the Kyuubi at bay. He was the only one that answered.

Hidan snorted. "So nothing then," he said. He tipped his head back to look at the sky briefly before he looked around at them all. The water had cleaned the gel out of his hair and it looked soft and silky as it fell messily around his face. "You've got a Jinchuuriki and the sister of an ex-Jinchuuriki and none of you know anything?"

"Just get on with it," Sakura said.

Hidan shrugged. "A Bijou was born in Enmugakure," he said. He glanced at Temari. "The Shukaku, actually. It happened during the fight with Suna and Iwa." He snorted. "It was Shukaku that did the most damage."

Temari's fingers twisted in the fabric of her battle kimono. "Shukaku…" she whispered. She cleared her throat. "And how is a Bijou born?" she asked.

"He was human, once," Hidan said simply. "I don't know how or why he turned into a Bijou, but that's what happened." He gave a short, bitter sounding laugh. "Makes sense, really. The worst demons are always human."

Naruto's hand, still pressed against his seal, tensed. The Kyuubi had been human? He had something that had once been human sealed inside of him? He suddenly felt slightly ill.

"Did you know him?" Sakura asked. "Shukaku, I mean, before he turned into a Bijou."

An odd look flickered across Hidan's face. "Yes," he said shortly. He paused, let out a slow breath, and looked back up at the sky. Naruto followed his gaze. The sky was darkening now, fading from blue through grey and purple to black. Sunsets were always so quick in the desert, he'd noticed.

"He was my father," Hidan said quietly. When Naruto looked at him in shock, Hidan was still staring at the sky, watching the stars appear. He watched as Temari bit her lip and closed her eyes before reaching out and touching Hidan's arm. He wondered if she had felt the same horror he had at the thought of the Bijou being human once.

From the corner of his eye, he saw Shikamaru's eyes narrow and his gaze fix on Temari's hand. He sighed inwardly. He should have known that the tension would be back.


	7. The Descent

**Disclaimer:** See the first chapter.

**AN:** RL is a pain in the ass. Seriously.

* * *

_Here is no water but only rock  
Rock and no water and the sandy road  
The road winding above among the mountains  
Which are mountains of rock without water  
If there were water we should stop and drink  
Amongst the rock one cannot stop or think  
Sweat is dry and feet are in the sand  
If only there were water amongst the rock  
Dead mountain mouth of carious teeth that cannot spit  
Here one can neither stand or lie or sit  
There is not even silence in the mountains  
But dry sterile thunder without rain_

The Wasteland

T. S. Eliot

Part VII

The Descent

Even Temari, who had grown up among the shifting red sands of the Wind Country desert had to admit that once they left the oasis, their path grew difficult. The ground seemed to sink beneath them as they walked, although they could see the mountains that formed the border with Earth Country rising up before them like gigantic, jagged teeth. The mountains were black granite, thrusting up from under the sandstone that most of Wind Country lay on to pierce the clear blue sky. They looked ominous, but nowhere near as ominous as where they were going.

Apparently, the most hospitable path into Enmugakure that didn't involve a highly dangerous detour into enemy territory was through a valley. While it didn't sound particularly dangerous to the Konoha shinobi, Temari knew better. Desert valleys were little better than sun traps, and this one in particular was especially dangerous. It had been formed by a long-dry river wearing its way through the sandstone down to the black granite that lay beneath. The sides of the valley, according to the map, were high and steep, and the grains of sand that would cling to the walls would make it difficult to climb out even with the use of chakra.

Temari was worried, going down there, but she trusted Hidan to know what he was doing. They had plenty of water, and while Sakura and Naruto especially were wearing unsuitable clothing, she knew that they would be fine as long as they obeyed instructions and kept themselves hydrated. If they combated the chance of heat stroke properly, then all they had to worry about was an ambush from intruding Iwa-nin, which wasn't all that likely. Iwa was still licking its wounds after the last Great War when the Yondaime Hokage had pretty much obliterated them single-handedly. The threat of Akatsuki was small too, as Temari was pretty sure that only Uchiha Itachi had any idea of where they were, and she didn't think he would betray them after going through all this trouble. After all, there had to be easier ways and more accessible places than the remotest corner of the Wind Country deserts to ambush and obtain the Kyuubi Jinchuuriki.

Even so, it was best to be on guard.

She let her eyes trail over their small party as they trudged wearily through the sand. Shikamaru was still being a moody bastard – which she really didn't understand; he had chosen Ino over her, but he still got pissed off over her flirting with someone else? Hypocrite – Sakura looked tired, Naruto looked like he'd much rather be sitting in a ramen bar, slurping down noodles in the shade. Hidan, on the other hand…

Temari's gaze lingered on him. He had a look of such intense concentration on his face that it was almost scary. She'd never seen him fight before, but she got the impression that he was the sort of person who would sneer and laugh as he fought, throwing his opponents off guard with sarcastic comments, Jashinist speeches and his inability to die.

She was still curious about his immortality. Was it a side effect from being related to a Bijou?

But the intense look he wore as he walked, straight-backed and fearless in the direction of Earth Country – and, undoubtedly, Enmugakure – was unlike anything she had ever seen on him. His eyes were narrowed, his jaw was set, and if it wasn't for the fact that he was moving, she could easily have mistaken him for one of the statues of the Kazekages in her brother's office, glaring down at the world in righteous distain. Only…it wasn't quiet distain on his face, either. He was just focussed. Focussed on their destination, on ignoring Shikamaru's hostility, on defeating the Akatsuki…

But it made her nervous. She'd know, instinctually, that Hidan was dangerous, but she'd never truly seen it on his face before. She'd never thought of him as being more dangerous even than Gaara before.

The look on his face had her placing him at a level with a Kage. She wondered what seeing him in battle would do to her estimation of him.

She tore her gaze away from him once more, fixing it on the jagged black horizon. She found herself hoping that she never would have to see Hidan in that sort of situation.

The silence of their group was broken by a loud gurgling noise. She half turned, incredulously, to look at Naruto who was blushing to the roots f his golden hair and rubbing his stomach. He grinned nervously, blue eyes creasing up into little slits as he did.

"Hey, is it time to stop for lunch yet? Only I think that if I don't eat I'll digest my spine, or something, and I kind of need that," he said.

Temari rolled her eyes. There were times when he reminded her of Kankuro – or, at least, Kankuro when Gaara wasn't around – not in speech, but in mannerisms. She'd seen that hungry, hopeful look on her brother's face far too many times.

"I think Naruto's right," Sakura said. "We do need a break."

"Okay," Temari agreed. "That okay with you, Hidan?"

He looked at her. The intense look had vanished from his face, replaced by something she couldn't quite describe. "Sure," he said.

Temari felt something twist in her chest. She realised, suddenly, that this was painful for him. That he didn't want to return to Enmugakure; that he'd hoped that the people and the village that he'd buried there in the wake of Shukaku, Iwa and Suna's would stay buried. She smiled at him tentatively before lowering her pack to the ground. She caught Shikamaru's eye as she did so, and found him glaring again.

She sighed. "What?" she asked. Out of the corner of her eye, she saw both Sakura and Naruto freeze halfway through rummaging their packs for rations. "What's the problem Shikamaru?" she asked again.

He looked away. "Nothing," he said. "Just…stay away from him."

There was no doubt in Temari's mind who the 'him' in question was. She glared. "Why?" she asked. "Jealous? You chose Ino, remember? I'm a big girl Shikamaru, I can take care of myself."

"Not against him," Shikamaru muttered.

"What happened with you guys?" she asked. "Or do I not get a reason for this bullshit?"

"He's pissed off 'cause I killed his sensei," Hidan said from behind her. He moved, then, into her peripheral vision. He was smirking slightly, as if the memory of the death amused him. "Your buddy here is the only person in years to come close to getting rid of me permanently – apart from myself, of course. He fucking blew me up with a net full of explosive tags, right? Took the Hokage five days to figure out what fucking went where after Itachi insisted they did me up to come out here."

She swallowed. Her throat felt dry, as if she'd just swallowed a mouthful of sand. She'd met Sarutobi Asuma a couple of times. He'd been a good person, and he'd been very close to Shikamaru. But that wasn't what bothered her; shinobi died in battle all the time. It wasn't unusual; more of a fact of life rather than anything else.

"Why?" she asked. "Why are you on first name terms with a member of the Akatsuki?"

It was the second time he'd called Uchiha Itachi by his given name, something that most shinobi wouldn't do. They either called him the Uchiha Traitor or by his full name. Never by his given name. It was some sort of taboo.

"Because he was one of them," Naruto said quietly. Sakura closed her eyes, as if awaiting an explosion. Shikamaru looked away from her.

She felt anger boil up in the pit of her belly. Hidan was one of them? He was one of those bastards who was after Naruto? One of the utter, complete bastards who had killed her baby brother? A kunai was in her hand, pressed against the pale column of his throat before she even realised what she was doing. She snarled up at him, baring her teeth in fury and glaring for all she was worth. Killing intent and chakra radiated from her body. His grin faded, revealing the solemn expression he had been wearing before they had started to set up camp.

A thin line of blood welled up under the edge of her blade and trickled down his neck.

"Bastard," she growled.

Something sparked in his gaze, and despite her anger she felt a thrill of something run down her spine. "What're you waiting for Temari?" he asked. He dragged out her name, savouring every syllable on his lips and tongue as if it was rich chocolate rather than just a name. "If you want to try and kill me then do it."

She stared up at him, the snarl falling from her lips. He looked so old, all of a sudden. His skin wasn't wrinkled or liver-spotted; he didn't suddenly appear frail – on the contrary, he looked stronger than ever – but there was something…a wistful twist to his lips; the look in his eye. He looked bleached out, apart from his eyes, which seemed to almost glow.

He wanted to die, she realised. He had nothing to live for except his religion.

Her grip on the kunai relaxed. She whipped it away from his neck, leaving only a shallow cut behind, and threw it down into the sand. She held her body perfectly still against his, the fingers of her other hand twisted in the warm black material of his shirt. She could feel his heart beating. She could feel his chakra – for the first time, she realised, he suppressed it so well she'd never felt it before – thrumming away beneath his pale skin. She raised the hand that had held the kunai once more, and used it to grip the back of his neck. His eyes widened, and for the first time since she had attacked him, he looked uncertain.

She pulled him down as she leaned up, and she pressed her lips to his ear. "I won't kill you," she hissed, "I won't even try. Not unless you go back to those motherfuckers."

"Why?" he asked, and the feel of his breath across her face made her shiver.

"Because you're wrong," she replied. "You do have something to live for, if you want it."

"Temari…" she heard Shikamaru growl her name from somewhere behind her, but she didn't care. She pulled away from Hidan slightly and met his gaze again. His confusion was palpable – cute, really, she thought. She lowered her gaze to the thin trickle of blood running down his neck. The wound hadn't quite healed yet, though the bleeding had slowed. It pooled slightly in the dip of his collar bone, and the thick red liquid shone hypnotically in the bright sunlight. She looked up at his face again, met his gaze deliberately before she leaned in and licked the blood away from his collar bone, following its path back up his neck to the cut she'd given him. His breath caught.

Shikamaru hissed her name again, and she heard scuffling footsteps behind her as if someone was trying to escape another person's grasp. She ignored them, and revelled instead in the metallic taste of blood on her tongue and the dusty scent of Hidan's skin.

She pressed a kiss to the wound on his throat and stepped back. His blood clung to her lips like the sticky juice of an exotic fruit, but she met his incredulous stare proudly, silently challenging him. Akatsuki bastard he might have once been, but he was…Hidan. He was Hidan. And whether he wanted it or not, she was going to drag him back into the world of the living.

His lips twitched, and then stretched into a grin. "Well shit," he said. "That was pretty fucking hot, blondie."

She scowled. "Temari," she corrected.

He laughed.

* * *

The walls of the valley rose up on either side of them, worn sheer by water and sand and wind. Hidan led them carefully across the dusty ground, carefully stepping around loose stones and skeletons. Small desert creatures, mostly, whose bones looked so frail that they might crumble at the slightest touch. Temari walked behind him, then Sakura, then Naruto, then Shikamaru; after her little display earlier they had decided that it would be safer for all of them to keep Shikamaru as far away from Hidan as physically possible. Not that, she thought, he really had anything to be jealous over. Yes, she had been his girlfriend once, but that was over; Hidan hadn't stolen her. Yes, Hidan had killed his sensei, but Shikamaru had blown him up and buried him alive; he'd had his revenge.

Although, she thought, it was possible that his hatred for Hidan partially stemmed from a similar emotion as the one that made Hidan reluctant to return to Enmugakure.

A desire for the dead to stay buried and forgotten.

She watched the ends of Hidan's fine, silvery hair brush over his shoulders. Ever since he had bathed at the oasis, he had worn it loose. He'd forgotten to pack hair gel, apparently; he looked better for it. She felt her cheeks redden – nothing to do with the heat of the valley; it was like walking through an oven – and looked away. Her gaze landed on the towering walls of the valley, and she frowned.

"Temari?" Sakura asked tentatively. "Are you alright?"

"Yeah," Temari croaked. She cleared her throat and reached for her water flask to take a tiny sip. The water was warm, but it did its job. "I just thought I…can you see patterns on the walls? Up there, by the top?"

Sakura looked up and frowned. "I…yes," she said after a moment. "They're faint, but I can see them. Look! There's holes too."

Temari squinted upwards, shading her eyes with her hand. Around her, the others did the same; all except Hidan, who stood back and let them get on with it. "Oh yeah," she murmured. "What are they?"

She glanced over at Hidan when she asked. He glanced up at them briefly, before giving her a rueful smile. "Tombs," he said. "This place is a Jashinist graveyard, reserved for the priests of the order that used to live around here. The carvings are their names, details of their lives, stories and symbols of Jashin-sama. That sort of thing. They were old before I was born."

"Can you read the writing?" Sakura asked.

Hidan nodded. "It's the same language the Book of Jashin's written in," he said. "Not that I can read it from all the way down here, anyway."

"You make it sound like this Jashin guy was pretty popular at one point," Naruto said.

Hidan sneered. "Jashinism was widespread up until about a hundred years ago," he said. "When rumours about that bastard Shukaku and what he had been got out, the priests were hunted down and slaughtered." He looked back up at the tombs again. "It was a fitting end for them. People tried to forget about Jashin-sama after that, and the rumours passed into obscure myth. No one believes in anything anymore. No one gives a fuck about their immortal fucking soul. It's all money and possessions and immortality."

He paused.

"Everything changed, and everything that had come before that was forgotten. That's why we've got fuckers like the Akatsuki and Orochimaru, thinking that fucking around with eternal life and demons if a brilliant fucking idea. Load of crap. Everything dies. Everyone dies. They should. There's no fucking point in living forever."

He turned away from them then, and began to walk away. He glanced back at them over his shoulder, and Temari saw that look in his eyes again: the weight of his life pressing down on him.

"Are you coming or what?"


	8. The Dark

**Disclaimer:** See the first chapter.

**AN:** Bet you thought this was dead. But yeah, I reiterate. RL is a bitch. (And the manga has completely screwed my plot for this, but hey. What the heck. It's an AU for a reason.)

_

* * *

_

_It's me! It's me the fauna's fleeing. Nothing'll keep still.  
My adrenalin moves Nature now and not God's heavenly will.  
Lean closer as the darkness grows. My vision's fogged by breath  
Clouding up the window as life's clouded up by death._

The Death of the PWD Man  
Tony Harrison

Part VIII

The Dark

The valley had stretched on for what seemed like forever, but they had finally reached its end. In front of them a sheer wall of black granite stretched up to the sky, almost blocking out the sun. At their feet, though, the earth had fallen away leaving a gaping black hole that made Sakura think of a giant mouth waiting to swallow them up forever. A thin waterfall plummeted into it from the top of the cliff, roaring its way down and soaking them with a fine spray of rainbow mist. It was beautiful. She hadn't realised, before this mission, that Wind Country could be so lovely. Oh, she'd hated the trek through the desert but the oasis and the sunsets and this…

She glanced sideways at Temari and saw the other kunoichi was smiling. Her chin was lifted and her lips were curled with pride, and Sakura realised that Temari was proud of this: the hidden spots of beauty that her country concealed in its endless sands.

"It's a dead end," Naruto said. Sakura sighed inwardly. Naruto was sweet, but he definitely had no appreciation for natural beauty. It was either that or he was too exhausted by the difficult journey and the tension that hung over them to care.

"We go down there," Hidan said.

They all stared at him incredulously. He looked back at them, a pale eyebrow raised and a wicked smirk on his lips. Sakura resisted the urge to hit him.

"Enmu was a _hidden_ village," he said, and she could practically feel the sarcasm in his voice oozing over her skin. "You didn't seriously think all it would take was a fucking stroll, did you? Fucking hell…" He trailed off and looked back down at the abyss.

It seemed to stare back at him.

"Troublesome," Shikamaru muttered. "If this is some kind of joke –"

He didn't get to finish. Hidan looked back at him with such an expression of rage on his face that Sakura flinched back, stumbling into Naruto. His hands came up to grip her upper arms and they were warm and calloused and gentle.

"Shut the fuck up," Hidan said.

"That's enough," Temari said. "Let's take a break for a bit." She looked around at them all, daring them to argue. Not for the first time, Sakura saw Hidan's expression soften as he looked at her. Something inside of her stung with jealousy and she tore her gaze away.

Temari continued, looking up at Hidan as she did. "Maybe you could explain the next part of the route a bit. Just to ease peoples' paranoia." She shot a glare towards Shikamaru at that, and he glared right back at her. But he dropped to the ground and pulled his pack of cigarettes and his out of his jounin vest.

He lit up and Sakura sighed, mentally running through the list of diseases he could get from it. _Asthma, emphysema, cancer of the lung, the throat and the mouth, bronchitis, pneumonia_… She saw Temari wrinkle her nose.

"You okay Sakura-chan?" Naruto was still holding her arms, she realised, and his breath was hot against her ear.

"Fine," she said. She stepped away from him and lowered herself to the valley floor. He sat down next to her and grinned. It was forced; too wide and with scrunched-up eyes and for a split second, she hated him for it.

* * *

"The river eroded a series of tunnels under the ground. The best – the safest – way to get into Enmu is through them."

Temari rested her chin on her palm and watched Hidan closely as he explained his route. It did make sense, in a way. The place where Enmu had been was now uncomfortably ensconced within the boundaries of Earth Country, and even though there had been no threat to them from Iwa-nin so far, she didn't want their group to be noticed. Neither, apparently, did Hidan. And it was for good reason: the relations between Iwa, Suna and Konoha were a crate of worms that she didn't want to have to open.

She may have ended up stuck doing a lot of diplomatic visits to other nations on Gaara's behalf in recent years, but she had nowhere near enough talent to stop them from being ruthlessly assassinated for illegally crossing Earth's borders.

"You haven't been here in years by your own admission," Shikamaru argued. "What if you've forgotten the way and we're stuck down there forever." Temari shuddered. She saw Sakura and Naruto do the same.

"I remember it," Hidan said, and there was that tone in his voice again that meant that they were getting close to a topic that he didn't want to talk about. Whatever had happened there, Temari realised, had screwed him up a lot and she was beginning to suspect that seeing his father turn into the Shukaku wasn't the only thing that was bothering him about his imminent return.

"And besides, the only other path I know of comes from the other side of the border," he continued. "So if you want to head in the direction of Iwa for a few weeks with a fucking Yellow Flash lookalike in the group so that I can find _that_ one…sure. Why the hell not. After all, I'm not going to be dead at the fucking end of it."

Shikamaru fell silent.

"You know a road from Iwa?" Sakura asked quietly. "Why?"

"I was born there," Hidan replied.

Temari blinked in surprise. She'd known that he hadn't originally come from Enmu despite the hitai-ate but she hadn't given a thought about where he could have originated from. He seemed so old at times – he was – that she'd grown used to thinking that he had just been around forever. Even though she knew that he'd had a father, she hadn't thought of him having an origin or a family. She bit her lip.

"Do you have family?" she asked.

"None alive," he replied.

She thought of her brothers dying, remembered the pain she'd felt when she realised that Gaara was dead and the joy at his resurrection. Hidan was smiling at her. It was crooked and strangely warm with something she couldn't place.

"How long will it take?" Shikamaru asked, interrupting the moment – making her look away with a blush staining her cheeks; making her feel like an academy student with a crush on the class genius – with a bitter-sounding drawl.

"Two days."

Shikamaru sighed and stood. He hauled himself to his feet as though it took a lot of effort, and stretched his arms above his head. "Let's go then," he said. "I don't think I can take much more of this."

* * *

She used her chakra to stick her feet to the slippery stone wall of the hole and walk as carefully down into the earth as she could. It was cold and wet and impossibly dark and all she could hear was the roaring of the waterfall as it plummeted down. She could feel the walls of it closing in on her and the moist air caught in her lungs.

In front of her, she could see what little light there was glinting off the three blades of Hidan's scythe and his pale, pale hair. Looking at him like this reminded her of an old ink drawing of a ghost she'd seen in her father's library when she'd been little.

They were all trusting him in this, she realised. They were trusting him to guide them on the say-so of Uchiha Itachi. None of it made any sense, but – Temari realised – regardless of the illogic, she trusted him anyway.

She just hoped she was right.


End file.
